MTT strategy? Change of thought.

OK here goes...
for the past two years of me playing MTTs i've been playing ABC poker playing micro-low stakes. This method seems to get me to the bubble without much of a stake... normally 2/3 of the average. Then I think im quite decent post bubble, with 3 bet shoving and squeeze plays etc etc.
But it's early on that i question. Yesterday I played a few MTTs and some multi table sit n gos and increased my VPIP early on by about 10-15%... just seeing flops... limping a lot more... (which I would see people do very often previously and think they're the worst players ever).... anyway yesterday i either crashed out of tourneys or built a huge stack... being top 10 chip stack out of 1000 in the majority. For example i tripled up with 89 with the nuts on the turn, flushed with 56s etc etc. these hands i'd normally throw away in these MTTs unless opening on the button or cut off.

Maybe i was just very lucky or maybe change of thought??

I play in a similar way. I see a lot of flops, build a huge stack and then destroy others with an aggressive bully strategy. That's just explaining it simply though. There is a lot to it but if you are playing deep stack poker early in mtt's why not take the implied odds?

It all depends on how well of a reader you are as well.

I say try it out for a bunch of micro and small mtts and see how it works for you and see if you can improve.

Have you ever read daniel negreanu's power holdem or whatever its called? You're describing his small ball method basically. see a lot of flops, outplay people postflop, pot management. One of the keys that you might want to try is to make your open-bet smaller, depending what size it is already.
I play on pokerstars and I changed my bet slider bar options to include a 2.5xBB button. That is my raise if I open. If someone limped before me I go 3bb's. It's very cool once the anti's kick in because on a full tournament table the ante's and the BB and SB are often a bit more than 2.5 BB's. So even if your steals only work once out of twice it is +EV. At certain times in the tournament you can easily do it 2 out of 3 on the last three positions.
Plus, when you do get called you have a very wide range and the pot is more manageable. And you can play like you've mentioned.

yea i think you have to make the most of the low blinds early in an MTT...focus more on position and implied odds than the cards necessarily...dont fall in love with draws and be willing to let them go to a bet you arent comfortable calling...as long as you can stay disciplined you can build up a huge stack early on and coast thru the first few levels for a while, focusing more on solid hands to pad your stack, until later in the tournament where you can switch back to picking spots and implied odds...definitely a good strategy, and much better than just waiting for premium hands while the blinds get bigger and bigger

This seems to be a smart thing to do, while it works for a lot of players, I still havent got it down to a fine art.
I am though, opening up my range at the moment, so in turn, I will be seeing a lot more flops.
I will keep you posted on how it goes.

Early on, there seem to be very few raises that will isolate -- either you're chasing everyone away or you get more callers than you want. Keeping pots small to see a flop seems a prudent strategy...

Now what to do with those Aces with a coordinated flop!!!